5 Steps to Stop Freezing Up and Start Speaking Up in Meetings
While recovering from the potent mix of COVID booster plus flu shot this past weekend, I binge-watched the Netflix reality show Culinary Class War from South Korea.
(Are you also a fan of Korean food and language? Let's be friends.)
In the show, I saw something strikingly familiar:
Pros — who have highly sought-after skills and are credentialed up the wazoo — looking nervous and tense in front of the judges as they slid their meticulously-prepared dishes for evaluation.
Anxious expressions reflecting the belief so many ambitious professionals share — “I won’t survive if I don’t please them.”
Or said another way: “I’m not good enough if they don’t like what I have to offer.”
When I'm lying on my couch with my feet up and swaddled in my fleece bathrobe, the manufactured drama does a superb job of distracting me from body aches.
But when I’m in my home office coaching my client struggling with this belief, I’m like a hawk with a mission.
Because I get it.
I'm a woman of color and a recovering people pleaser. I know intimately how painful it can be to feel self-conscious about how I'm perceived and judged by others.
When my clients tell me how they spin out in anxious rumination or freeze up without speaking up in large meetings -- I know it ain't because they haven't tried hard enough.
The truth is, they're trying too hard to push against a belief that cuts right into their sense of safety and self-worth. It's a Sisyphean effort, laborious and futile, that can drain resilience, creativity, and grit.
Sisyphus GIF by Kiril Gornishki
So, here are the 5 steps I walk my clients through in coaching:
We Get to the Source: We dive into where the belief stems from. For many of us, it's a habituated pattern that started early in life, often reinforced by cultural or gender expectations. Raising awareness is the key to loosening its grip, because a pattern, once understood, can be interrupted and changed.
Conscious-Subconscious Alignment: We address the fear head-on. When anxiety spikes, your heart rate spikes and your attention narrows as your body prepares for a flight-fight-freeze response. It’s as if your subconscious believes your survival is under threat. Your subconscious needs to align with the conscious awareness that your chances of remaining alive are never at stake, no matter what Steve in R&D thinks about you. This alignment enables you to reduce cortisol, breathe deeper, and see your options more clearly.
Cultivate Self-Validation: This isn't about becoming an arrogant blowhard. It requires the humility to celebrate small wins and the patience to practice self-compassion. When the world has taught us to beat ourselves up, cultivating self-validation is a radical thing to do that gradually leads to self-confidence.
Make Decisions Ahead of Time: One of the most effective leadership skills I teach is to make decisions ahead of time about how you want to show up, regardless of the outcome. Whether it's sharing an idea or speaking up in a meeting, decide in advance that you're going to contribute, not because you're expecting anyone's approval, but because you value your own ideas and voice. This way, you reclaim agency and authority while reducing stress.
Embrace Saying it Awkward: Here's something I say to my clients again and again, "If it feels awkward, you're doing it right."
Feeling awkward is a sign that you're stepping outside your comfort zone (aka where the magic is). Perfection is a myth, and awkwardness is human. The more you allow yourself to speak even when it's slightly messy, the more you realize that people aren't judging as harshly as you think -- and that your value isn't diminished by a less-than-perfect delivery. In fact, those "awkward" moments are often where the best learning happens and where genuine connection is made (aka magic).
If this resonates with you -- whether it's the pressure to please, the fear of being judged, or feeling stuck in a cycle of perfectionism -- you don't have to navigate it alone.
Imagine what could shift if you had a custom-tailored coaching plan designed specifically to help you break free from your limiting beliefs, so you can step into your awesome-sauce, advocate, and take the lead in your career.
Book a free consultation with me today and let's get you your custom step-by-step plan to the transformation that's as satisfying as the finale of any binge-worthy show.
